Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Arista Networks Platform vs Cisco Nexus comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 8, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
6.7
Arista Networks Platform delivers good ROI, justifies higher costs with long-term savings, especially compared to Cisco and Juniper.
Sentiment score
7.4
Cisco Nexus provides strong ROI through reliability, automation, cost-effectiveness, and improved business continuity, justifying its initial investment.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.6
Arista Networks Platform offers fast, proficient support, praised for direct engineer access and high customer satisfaction globally.
Sentiment score
7.2
Cisco Nexus support is praised for its responsiveness, expertise, and reliable Smart Net service, despite occasional variability in communication.
They provide instant support and maintain commitments regarding replacement products.
According to my team’s feedback, we receive extended support from the Arista team.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.9
Arista Networks Platform offers scalable, reliable networking for data centers, praised for network capacity, low latency, and intuitive management.
Sentiment score
7.8
Cisco Nexus is scalable, flexible, and ideal for large deployments, offering high port density and efficient, adaptable networking solutions.
Scalability is a key feature of Arista, owing to the possibilities to manage the entire data center network from a single console.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.9
Arista Networks Platform is highly stable with minimal downtime, praised for reliability when following best practice configurations.
Sentiment score
8.0
Cisco Nexus is favored for its reliability and consistent performance, despite minor software bugs and occasional hardware issues.
 

Room For Improvement

Arista Networks needs better documentation, integration, pricing, security, stability, management, community support, and network feature expansion.
Cisco Nexus users desire improved GUI, integration, automation, ACI capabilities, reduced costs, enhanced support, and simplified configurations.
Feature-wise, it addresses most customer requirements.
Arista Networks is currently less popular as they were initially more focused on data centers than campus networks.
 

Setup Cost

Arista Networks is costly, with high hardware and licensing expenses, especially compared to Huawei and NETGEAR, affecting affordability.
Cisco Nexus offers competitive pricing with high initial and renewal costs but provides valuable long-term technology benefits.
Compared to Cisco, Arista routers are significantly cheaper.
Arista products are perceived as costly, especially compared to competitors like Cisco.
 

Valuable Features

Arista Networks Platform is praised for its reliability, scalability, Linux shell, efficient management, automation, and unmatched monitoring capabilities.
Cisco Nexus excels in speed, flexibility, and reliability with advanced features, high scalability, and seamless data center performance.
Features include plug-and-play auto-discovery, allowing centralized configuration and management.
The most valuable features of Arista include low latency, scalability, and sustainability of the products.
 

Categories and Ranking

Arista Networks Platform
Ranking in Data Center Networking
3rd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
27
Ranking in other categories
Ethernet Switches (14th)
Cisco Nexus
Ranking in Data Center Networking
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
104
Ranking in other categories
LAN Switching (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the Data Center Networking category, the mindshare of Arista Networks Platform is 15.8%, down from 24.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Nexus is 18.9%, up from 15.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Center Networking
 

Featured Reviews

MarekSzafrański - PeerSpot reviewer
Affordable for enterprise-sized companies
Speaking about whether the product enhanced our company's data center scalability, I would say that it was a solution that was used in a banking company, where it served as a replacement for Cisco. Though Arista Networks Platform is similar to Cisco IOS CLI, I feel that the former product offers better prices compared to the latter tool. Arista Networks Platform office is more efficient at a lower cost. I recommend the product to those who plan to use it. The tool is stable and cheaper than Cisco. I would say that Arista Networks Platform is 100 percent compatible with the existing infrastructure in my company. The impact of the tool's network telemetry on our company's troubleshooting practices was just good for the scope for which I need the product. I rate the overall tool a nine out of ten.
Joe Benítez - PeerSpot reviewer
Offer high performance capabilities and enables efficient data transmission and processing
Before Nexus, I used to have Catalyst 6500 switches. Those 6500 series chassis gave us a lot of problems. Too many problems, actually. And we had a Cisco ASA firewall blade within those chassis. And they were running outdated software. So, in fact, it was the firewall blade that caused us too many problems instead of the chassis. The chassis itself was working well and performing fine, but the firewall card was not suitable for our needs. That was one aspect. Additionally, those chassis had been in operation for more than five years. As we are a local government, we have a policy to renew hardware every five years. That's because we need to maintain all the hardware and software in the latest versions and keep up with the technology lifecycle of the technology we use.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Data Center Networking solutions are best for your needs.
839,164 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
University
7%
Computer Software Company
25%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Arista Networks Platform?
Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Arista Networks Platform?
Compared to Cisco, Arista routers are significantly cheaper. The customer price for an Arista router is approximately $7,000 USD, while Cisco's is around $18,000.
What needs improvement with Arista Networks Platform?
Arista Networks is currently less popular as they were initially more focused on data centers than campus networks. They should expand further into campus networks.
What do you like most about Cisco Nexus?
The product's initial setup phase is very easy.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Nexus?
Cisco pricing is at the same level as many competitors, however, due to competition, they sometimes lower prices and offer large discounts.
What needs improvement with Cisco Nexus?
Cisco's security features are in line with other OEMs, however, for data center security in terms of layer seven security, we prefer to have different OEMs rather than relying solely on Cisco.
 

Also Known As

7000 Series
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

American Internet Services
Advanced Medical Transport, Banco de Guayaquil, Baylor Scott & White Health, BH Telecom, Bowling Green State University, Calligaris, Children's Hospital Colorado, City of Biel, Del Papa Distributing, Department of Justice, Dimension Data, Dualtec Cloud Builders, Electricity Authority of Cyprus, Grupo Industrial Saltillo (GIS), Hertz, K&L Gates , LightEdge, Lone Star College System, Management Science Associates, Mindtree, NBC Olympics, Quest, Sony Corporation, The Department of Education in Western Australia, Valley Proteins
Find out what your peers are saying about Arista Networks Platform vs. Cisco Nexus and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
839,164 professionals have used our research since 2012.